Blogs from Israel, Middle East - page 134

Shalom, everyone. Thank you to everyone who has been keeping up with my journey - its trials and tribulations, its joys and passion. While this visit to Israel has been most memorable, I look forward to returning to a semblance of normalcy in Minnesota. There, my journey will definitely continue... Sunday, August 10, 2008 Okay, so I’ve humbled myself a little bit in regards to Tish B’Av, this fasting holiday mourning the destruction of the Temple. I have since learned that several tragic events in Jewish history happened on this date or close to it, so observance has come to include those as well. A group of remaining summer students and staying-for-the-year students gathered last evening to enjoy an end-of-Shabbat-getting-ready-to-fast potluck meal, davening, and then a walk to the “egalitarian” section of the Wall to read ... read more

Tuesday, July 29, 2008 Playing hooky on this Tuesday afternoon. Actually, I’ve decided none of the classes interest me on Sunday and Tuesday afternoons so my day ends at 4pm instead of 5:15. Gets to be a long day otherwise! I can tell I am nearing the end of my stay here not only because of not being in class all the way through the afternoon but also I have been coming back to the apartment for lunch instead of bringing it to the yeshiva. Laziness, perhaps? How unlike me to not make and bring a lunch for the day!! (you can stop laughing now, Shari!). And it isn’t like I don’t have time in the morning to make a lunch; I do. I just choose to fill it with doing other things like yoga, email, ... read more

Sitting in a cave like cafe downstairs from our hostel in the old part (inside the walled city) of Jerusalem. It' s amazing here; Muslim, Jewish and Christian pilgrims coexist but you can tell they don't really care for eachother. The people watching, to say the least, is interesting. We went to the Western Wall this afternoon and walked so much our legs are tired. Yesterday we went to the Sea of Galilee and swam in the lake that Jesus walked on. We've been here a week now! I can hardly believe it. Being a shiksa from California, I can say that an obvious sign of being in Israel are the bomb shelters (every few blocks there are underground buildings, in apartment buildings and hotels there is a bomb room near the elevator shaft) and scars ... read more

Asaf (Jason's Hebrew name, seems appropriate to refer to him that way while we are in his homeland) wrote the below at 3am: It is 3 AM here in Israel, and we are wide awake. We just got back from my brother Nadav's wedding. It was a really wonderful event. Especially considering that he only planned it a few weeks earlier, and seemed very casual about the whole thing (we were hanging out and swimming on the beach with him less than 2 hours before the wedding). But that's often the way it is here. And yet, they had a beautiful wedding in a beautiful garden, with great food and music. Of course, being Israel, there were 200+ people, most of them relatives. Our family alone is having at least 4 or 5 weddings in Israel ... read more

Sorry I haven't updated this in such a long time but, as you might imagine, I've been very busy. Susan has taken a side trip alone to Eliat to go snorkeling in the Red Sea, I decided not to go due to my toe having a nasty blister now, so will stay back and take care of it. Rather than backtrack to what we've done in the past week I will tell you what Bridgette and I did today...rather, I will let her tell you since she writes so well: The City of David National Park has a large tent facility between Mt Scopus and the Mt of Olives where you can go and volunteer to sift through the debris that was rescued by Hebrew U Archeology Dept. It is manned by a team of archeology ... read more